Angel Island Profile: Eliseo Felipe

Eliseo Felipe left the Philippines at the age of 19 to seek a better life in the United States. He arrived in 1933 and had an easy arrival in San Francisco since the Philippines were then a U.S. territory. He joined his brother and uncles who were working on the farms. When he returned to the U.S. in 1940, he was detained on Angel Island because the Philippines were in the process of becoming an independent country and were now subject to restrictions on immigration from Asia. He was surprised to be asked questions about where he had lived and worked when he lived in the U.S.